I'm not sure right away where this train of thought is going to go, but it has to do with aging and the changing relationship with the body. It's not body image in this case it's a lot more intimate than that. (Since this is a meandering thought as a try to nail it down in my own head please feel free to correct anything about this article.) Maybe the best way to start is to ask a question of anyone reading this especially if you been around for a few years on good old planet Earth.
Do you find certain parts of your body, perhaps your arms or legs disassociating from your mind a little bit? What used to be completely automatic and you never even thought about the fact that you just raised your arm to reach a can of peaches, is now something that not only you are much more conscious of because let's say got a little bit of arthritis but the connection between your mind and your arm does not feel as secure or fluid. Especially if whatever you're doing involves a little bit of straining, a little bit of pushing a boundary physically.
Does any of the above sound familiar? It is something of dealing with on a daily basis nowadays and it really has me pondering how to move through the rest of my life. I have lots of physical support in the facility I live in, but I find myself second-guessing whether or not I should undertake certain physical challenges. For example:
For months now I've been considering getting a 3D printer and the logistics of where to put it aside, I find myself asking "Can I safely remove the 3D object off the plate once it is finished?... Can I physically threatened the filament through the printing nozzle?" If you're not familiar with 3D printers they can get rather hot and at this stage there's a lot of physical fiddling that needs to be done.
I guess what it boils down to is: That certainty that I used to have about what I could and could not do is not currently there. It's all rather tentative.
What started me on this train of thought was I'm fixing a computer for friend and getting a simple memory stick back into the machine was more than a challenge. I was actually fighting little spasms and there was that disconnect. That feeling of "Who's driving this car?" At one point I almost hit the computer over because his spasms sort of jumped out of nowhere. But that statement isn't exactly accurate..... To give you a bit of background: I have Cerebral Palsy which is a condition in which one's muscles are somewhat tense all the time and motor control can be a little tentative, shall we say. So small spasms are not uncommon but I have found, if I really examine what was going on just before the spasm more often than not there is a psychological component. Perhaps a surprise, or a little bit of fear. Whatever the particular cause having Cerebral Palsy is a little like being a live biofeedback machine. What others may miss from the subconscious people like me get a physical response sometimes. Of course this can become a psychological loop which can feed in on itself. So this can be a bit of a predicament. Although the condition has probably gifted me with great insight and better internal world. I guess that also has to do with one's early upbringing.
So this whole aging and relationship with oneself topic really is weighing on my mind today. By the way I have just discovered that the memory stick in the computer I was repairing for my friend is bad so I have to take the darn thing out again. And then order a new part. So mother nature sounds like she's going to have me revisit this topic again down the road either with this computer or with some other physical situation.
The adventure continues! Stay tuned and take care,
Patrick
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